another check on the markets here. it took a dip after the president spoke. not so much what he said but there is still conflict out there. >> "closing bell" right now. hi, everybody. welcome to the "closing bell." i'm maria bartiromo. today coming to you live from the jpmorgan ceo technology summit. lots to talk about here. the fiscal cliff clearly remaining a hot button issue and a market driver. did the president's remarks on that today blunt the rally? we're taking a look. then we've got some heavy hitters lined up for you to talk about that, including former treasury secretary larry summers. he'll be with me in a few moments. we'll talk about strategy coming out of the white house today and what he thinks the president should do. later, it's the big interview of the day. my exclusive one on one with jpmorgan chase ceo jamie dimon. you'll want to hear what he

thinks about budget crisis, what needs to be done to fix it, and the banking sector. bill. >> well, i'm bill griffeth. we can't wait to hear what jamie dimon has to say about the fiscal cliff. it's the talk of the day. based on wall street's reaction to what president obama and house speaker boehner had to say earlier today, it is clear that investors are not expecting a quick fix. look at the major averages, which are lower since the president spoke two hours ago. the dow is up ten points. it was up 78 at high. down 67 now, up to 12,822. the nasdaq powered higher today by apple. there it goes again. we'll talk about that in a little bit. up 15 points on the nasdaq now at 2910. the s&p 500 index is up about five points at 1382. the market certainly didn't like what the president had to say at 1:00 eastern time. the dow was in positive territory when he began speaking. as you can see from the chart,

as the speech progressed, the dow started to fall. it did rebound a bit after the speech was over, but we have been heading lower again as we go into the final hour here. in today's "closing bell" exchange, dan mcmahon from raymond james is going to join us. also, john from gfi group. our senior economics reporter, steve liesman, and our own rick santelli. john, it is clear that the fiscal cliff has wall street's full attention right now. do you expect a -- something to happen by december 31 or not? >> we expect something is going to happen. what that's going to be, we don't have the clarity we're expecting just yet. i think it's simple math. everybody knows what has to be done. obviously, we've had many, many studies over the course of the last few years that tell us what has to be done. so it is math. it's just about them getting in a room and hammering out the details. so we obviously need some revenue and some cuts across the

board. i think it's how those are going play out in terms of what portion and how much is going to be what the market's really keying on. i think $4 trillion is basically the number that's kind of out there. i think if it comes in higher than that, it's going to be positive. if it doesn't, it's going to be a negative. >> so steve liesman, what do you think this tells us about compromise? over the last couple of days, we were all fuzzy. we were all in it together. john boehner coming out saying we are ready for you, mr. president, to lead us. the president saying i'm reaching across the aisle. and here he is today being adamant once again, i'm going to veto any legislation that does extend the cuts for anybody making more than 250 or $200,000. >> yeah, about a 72-hour honeymoon here. i don't think it lasted much longer than that. all those nice words and they fade right into the reality.

what we don't know and what's hard for me to understand as i try to figure out the economics of this are the politics of a presidential election. at the end of the day, the balance of power remains almost exactly the same. does the fact the president won an election make his hand any stronger? does it make it the same? does the idea he's not running for office again improve his power or make him weaker? i don't really know the answer to that. i do remember president bush saying he had a mandate, and watching that mandate fizzle as he tried to do social security reform. i'm not sure there's been any progress at all as a result of this election, maria. i'm not hearing it yet in the rhetoric. >> you have to wonder what the quid pro quo is. if he's going to draw that line in the sand that he's going to veto any legislation on the upper end tax cut, there has to be some quid pro quo at some point. dan, what do you think happens? obviously wall street didn't like what it heard. >> clearly not. the reaction was probably more

visceral than a lot of people anticipated, particularly as it rallied on election day and into the election, even though it was clear obama had the advantage. i think it's a lot of déjà vu all over again in terms of what the markets are seeing. we saw the same thing last august when we were facing the same type of crisis that we're facing now. people kind of thought it was a foregone conclusion. of course we're going to solve this debt ceiling issue. as it got closer and people became more concerned that, wow, maybe we won't, well, they solved it by kicking it down the can to where we are now. >> exactly. how do you want to invest right now then? what about the market reaction, dan? is this a precursor for what's to come? if we keep seeing this fighting between the two sides, are we going to see a market selloff? >> without a doubt. i think you can look back to history repeating itself. last august and september volume picked up, but the market was in

a downturn. i think that's what we're going to be faced with if we can't avoid the fiscal cliff. >> i know you want to say something, steve, but let's bring rick in first and talk about market action. not only today but this week and what you make of what the markets are expecting here in terms of the fiscal cliff. >> well, i'll tell you what, bill, the treasuries and the foreign exchange markets were totally held hostage to stocks. today was a tick by tick day where the stocks dictated the trade in treasuries and the dollar. obviously everybody is right that the stock market is vulnerable. i didn't expect a good moment. the president has four years and no other election coming up. i think it's going to be contentious. i don't think we're going to have any answers before december 31st. most of the traders i talked to trading s&ps and selling s&ps seem to have that on their mind. >> steve? >> yeah, i was just going to say i think the president right here right now needs to open up a new dialogue with wall street and with the business community.

i think there's a bit of bad blood. i don't think it serves either side well right now. i think part of that dialogue is going to be in the choice of who the treasury secretary is. part of that dialogue is going to be in the rhetoric surrounding the fiscal cliff and the decisions that are made right now. i don't think he can afford right now to completely ignore wall street. i think wall street is saying, you know what, you got to talk to us, mr. president. >> really good point, steve. >> he's all about main street. he doesn't care about wall street. >> could be. could be. >> we'll know soon. thank you, guys. >> thanks, everybody. >> well, the bias i'm told, maria, is to the downside. in fact, we're dipping back into negative territory for the dow. down a fraction right now. >> what volatility. what a day. don't anywhere. we have a huge show ahead for you on this special edition of the "closing bell." jamie dimon and more coming up. coming up, maria means

business. two major market movers talking exclusively to maria from the jpmorgan napa tech conference. first, the president's former top economic adviser larry summers reacts to the standoff in washington over the looming fiscal cliff. >> it could be the year we begin to solve our debt through tax reform and entitlement reform. >> we're serious about reducing the deficit. we have to combine spending cuts with revenue. that means asking the wealthiest americans to pay a little more in taxes. >> can a deal get done before the january 1st dead line? hear what he thinks straight ahead. then, jpmorgan chief jamie dimon talks about the market's post-election volatility and how he thinks they'll react if the government doesn't get the nation's fiscal house in order. plus, we get the state of business at jpmorgan since the london whale trading debacle. and remember the business

own who are threatened to fire workers if the president was re-elected? >> he's going prevent us from expa expanding, prevent us from growing. it's going to make my life miss able. >> well, now he's given his workers raises instead. why the change of heart? he's here in another first on cnbc interview. that's all ahead on this very special edition of the "closing bell."

all right. welcome back. we want to pursue more of this developing story out of washington. the sudden resignation of general david petraeus as the director of the cia. that resignation being accepted by the president a wile ago. general petraeus admitting to an extramarital affair as a result of all of this. we're joined by our nbc news colleague andrea mitchell with more on this. what can you tell us at this point? >> it was as shocking to me as to everyone else in washington. i was hearing the reports overnight. then we did manage to confirm this and get the announcement that the cia director sent to the work force today. he says that he went to the white house and asked the president to be allowed for personal reasons to resign, that after 37 years of marriage, he

showed, in his words, extremely poor judgment by engaging in an extramarital affair. he writes, such behavior is unacceptable as a husband and as the leader of an organization such as ours. this afternoon the president graciously accepted my resignation. he says as i depart, i want you to know it's been the greatest of privileges to have served with you. you have to believe how shocking this is to everyone in washington and around the nation. david petraeus, a four-star general who resigned from the military, retired from the military to take on the cia assignment. he had led our forces in iraq and afghanistan. most reepcently, he's been in t middle of the controversy, the investigations into what went wrong both before and after the attack on benghazi. he had already been called to testify as one of the witnesses at closed hearings next week before the senate intelligence committee chaired by senator diane feinstein. that, of course, we assume will proceed. we'll have to touch base with

the hill on that. his resignation will not change the importance of his testimony, but it is presumed by all involved that the agency will be well served because the deputy cia director is a veteran, b a career service member at the cia and very highly regarded. >> so andrea, that's what i wanted to ask you. what do we know about mr. morel and how his leadership will be different than petraeus'? it sounds like what you're saying, this has absolutely nothing to do with benghazi and all to do with that extramarital affair. >> that is what they say. i'm persuaded of it, at least at face value and of course this has all happened within the last hour. we're told that it does not have to do with benghazi, that this is sent as a signal that the agency is not acknowledging that the critics were right or that the critics have just cause in

the reports which still have to be investigated. the lead now is the senate intelligence committee. you've seen what happened on the house side. that was not a bipartisan effort. the senate operates very, very differently. >> the timing of all this, with the election, do you suspect this was brewing beforehand and the general was able to keep a lid on it and keep it quiet until after the election? >> i don't know that. i think it's quite possible, but i can't report that this was deliberately kept until after the election. certainly, it would have been a great distraction on all sides. but david petraeus was not a political figure. he certainly was not an ally of the president's. i'm not sure it would have taken anything away from the president. this does seem like a very human situation. this is a man who has, in the last year, i believe had prostate cancer and was successfully treated. he's very active, engaged member. holly petraeus, the daughter of

the superintendent at west point when petraeus was there, and also a ph.d. from princeton, holly informs twas in the consu advocate office. this is a terrible personal tragedy all around. >> indeed. andre andrea, thank you. >> you bet. >> we'll get back to the markets here. let me look around. yes, we're starting to come back a little bit here as we head toward the close. about 45 minutes left. the dow up 11 points. >> meanwhile, j.c. benny in the news. the sales plunged again. so is the stock today. apple also seeing its stock sliding recently. up next, could jcpenney actually be a better buy than apple? this you have to hear. >> yes, you do. also, our very own herb greenberg has been a long-time defender of ron johnson. now even he is starting to have some doubts. herb will join us later on "closing bell" coming up. stay tuned.

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jcpenney tumbling more than 4% today after the big earnings miss. apple entered bear market territory today, being down 20%

from their recent high, although shares are higher today. which stock is the better buy right now? by the way, what's the common denominator? jcpenney's ceo ron johnson used to run the retail side at apple. do you go with his new company or old company or neither? that's today in "talking numbers." gentlemen, good to see you. to the chartes. >> let's start with apple. what's interesting is the real trend has been a very strong up trend. the euphoria started in february this year. that's when we started to see the parabolic move. what's surprising is how long the stock actually spent in this euphoric range. now we're getting to more reasonable levels where i think it's not reflecting the same excessive sentiment. >> got to 700, kind of tested the waters a little bit, then had the 20% pullback. >> you can see we're almost back

into this trend channel. this is close to a buy here in apple. >> really? >> if we go to jcpenney -- >> wait a minute. just as long as it can remain above that trend channel? >> i think 500 to 550. i think it will bet gback into the trend channel at some point. >> okay. now the more volatile jcpenney. >> over the last three years, you can see this isn't really a bull market stock. it's been up and down, up and down. $19 to $20, which is where it was this morning, is a crucial support level. i think you could use it as a trading level. you could put it as a buy and use that as a stop. long-term, this is a much more broken chart to me than apple. >> all right. steve, you're the trader here. you know, two pretty interesting stocks, one very volatile in jcpenney. the other was the dream stock for so long in apple. who do you like better? >> bill, i much prefer apple. as a matter of fact, i bought apple yesterday. i bought more today. i think it's amazing the

sentiment shift, the extent of the sentiment shift an the quickness of it. gi just weeks ago we were told by apple bulls who almost spoke arrogantly about the stock that this company was untouchable. it was as if they had achieved cold fusion. now $150 lower and just a few weeks later, there's almost despondency in the air regarding apple. i believe now that is too pervasive. i think we have worked off the euphoria. i think apple is a stock to be owned at these price levels. i never thought we'd see this day. apple has become a bit of a dividend play, believe it or t not. its dividend yield is near 2%. treasury yield at 1.6%. i think apple represents real value when its dividend yield vastly exceeds the ten-year treasuries. >> definitely not in kansas anymore. >> apple going forward is a value stock. it's no longer a growth stock. >> what are we saying here? a value play that's a dividend

play? this is simply not steve jobs' apple anymore. what about jcpenney, steve? >> bill, i'm not at all interested in jcpenney. i think you want to go with ron johnson's former company. on the fundamental side, the biggest risk with jcpenney from here forward is the fact their cash burn rate. they have half of the cash on hand now they than they had a year ago. the problem is, their investment strategy keeps switching. secondly, we're not seeing any results. i think this company is in a severe financial crunch. i think the stock has shown us that. it is heading significantly lower. >> all right. good to see you both. thanks for joining us today. maria. >> all right, bill. thank you so much. coming up, are apple and the rest of the tech sector a good bet right now? we'll talk about technology. we'll also hear from the managing director of private equity firm silver lake, who is licking his chops on the recent pullback in technology. he's putting more money to work. find out where he's putting that money. then, jcpenney.

we're going to talk about that big decline as well. is a return to coupons the only way to save this retailer? is it already admitting as pitch? all that and larry summers joining me to talk policy. back in a moment. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 when i'm trading, i'm totally focused. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 and the streetsmart edge trading platform from charles schwab... tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 gives me tools that help me find opportunities more easily. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 i can even access it from the cloud and trade on any computer. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 and with schwab mobile, tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 i can focus on trading anyplace, anytime... tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 until i choose to focus on something else. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 trade at charles schwab for $8.95 a trade. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 open an account and trade up to tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 6 months commission-free online equity trading tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 with a $50,000 deposit. tdd#: 1-800-345-2550 call 1-866-294-5412.

welcome back. well, the stock market came off of the highs a little while ago, as you saw, as the president is not showing much bending in his fiscal cliff statement today. my next guest is optimistic we can get a deal done. joining me now, the former treasury secretary himself, larry summers, now a professor at harvard. he joins us for an interview exclusively. good to see you. >> good to be with you. >> thank you so much for joining us. when do you think we'll get a deal. the president just came out a few minutes ago. he said,ly veto any legislation that involves taxes being extended, cuts being extended for anyone making more than $200,000 and $250,000.

it feels like he's not bending at all. >> i think that a formula will be found. i think that the president very much wants to make a deal. the president's made clear th that -- he made it clear in the summer of 2007. he's prepared to address issues of medicare, issues of social security. he recognizes that everything has to be on the table. but, yes, as part of that deal, we are going to have to raise more revenues. you know, maria, if you take the long view of this, relative though where we've been as a country, the fraction of us who are over 65 is going to nearly double. we have more debt than we used to have. things that the government buys like health care, their price is going up faster than the price of other goods. so we're not going to be able to function with no revenue, and

with less revenue relative to our economy than we've had for 50 years. we're going to have to raise revenue. that revenue should come probably from the people who have been most fortunate over the last generation. that's the position the president's taking. i think it's a reasonable one. i think there's a shared reck a -- recognition between the president and the congress that it would be a catastrophe for the country if nothing was to be done and $600 billion was to be withdrawn from this economy. >> of course, the markets would also see that as a catastrophe. you know, there's an article in the "new york times" today. senator schumer was quoted. he said, look, we might be able to get that revenue you're talking about by eliminating the loopholes and leaving the highest tax rate at 35% rather than taking it up to 39.6%. it seems so petty to be discussing, you know, the tax rate on just a small portion of

the population. but do you think you can get that revenue by eliminating the loopholes and leaving taxes where they are, broadening the base, lowering the corporate rate? >> i think there's no question that broadening tax bases is the best way to raise revenue. how much revenue can you get? is it enough revenue? which elements of base broadening can you do? this is the stuff for the negotiation. broadening the base as a crucial part of tax reform, i think that's right. i think another way of putting essentially the same point is to say we've got all kinds of what are in effect expendtures through the tax code. when we encourage some activity through a tax credit or tax deduction and just like we want to cut government expenditure, we should also want to cut back on government tax expenditure. i think that's got to be an important theme as we move forward. just where tax rates are going to need to end.

that's something that will be worked out with the passage of time. i think the president has a very powerful point in saying that the tax rate cut for those with the highest income is probably the least stimulative way in which taxes could have been reduced simply because most of that money is not spent. >> you know the president. i mean, how will the economy be different in the next four years with his leadership for an additional four years, and do you think the president would accept a deal without raising the highest rate? >> the last thing i'm going to do is try to get involved in the negotiation. the president speaks very clearly for president's views on that. look, the president took an economy that was falling off a cliff. he took an economy where the economic statistics in the fall

of 2008 were worse than they had been in the fall of 1929. he stopped the fall. while it hasn't been as rapid as we would have liked, the economy has been climbing for the last three years. i think there's good reason to expect that that pace of increase can accelerate if we can avoid distractions like the fiscal cliff. as the housing market starts to turn, i think it's reasonable to hope that growth will accelerate, that the rate of job creation will increase, and we'll start to see what used to be vicious cycles become virtuous circles with more income growth leading to more hiring, leading to more income growth. that's the kind of environment that the president will, i'm sure, be working to put in place. >> what are the implications of going off the fiscal cliff? everyone's saying, well, a lot of economists i've spoken with are saying that the economy does dip back into recession in 2013 if we do nothing by year ends. do you agree with that? give us the on the ground

implications of going over the cliff. >> maria, to go over the cliff is to make recession and overwhelming likelihood to make severe recession a real possibility, to undermine the legitimacy of the united states in the world as a leader because it can't manage its own finances, and because of the implications for the pentagon budg budget. going over that cliff is an outcome that has to be avoided. at the same time, in saying that, it's an outcome that has to be avoided, that can't become a license for terror. that can't become a license that whoever is most unreasonable gets their way because we have to avoid going over the cliff.

i think a compromise will be found. >> what do you think is most important for the next treasury secretary? we know that tim geithner said he's going to stay until the fiscal cliff issues are complete. but then i've been reporting on this network a number of times that i think larry fink wants that job. there's a bit of a horse race going on. who do you think gets it, and what are the most important skill sets? >> maria, you know from a long experience of having me on this show that i stay out of questions of personality. look, the most important attribute of treasury secretary is the confidence of the president. the president should have in that position whoever he has the most confidence in their ability to provide economic leadership. economic leadership on what are obviously going to be crucial budget issues, crucial tax

reform issues or financial issues that will arides for the country. >> real quick, what's the best path for job creation and getting back toward the goal of growth and encreasing growth? >> one crucial piece is we need more public investment in this country. look at kennedy airport. look at so much of our infrastructure. if a time when construction unemployment approaches 15%, a time when the ten-year interest rate is about 160, if that's not the time to renew our country's infrastructure, i don't know when that time will ever come. >> great point. larry, great to talk with you. >> good to be with you. >> i'll have much more on the fiscal cliff when i speak exclusively to jpmorgan chase chairman and ceo jamie dimon. plus, find out if he thinks president obama will be more friendly to wall street in his second term. we'll take a short break. we have a market just higher, but barely. sitting above the positive line here.

it has given up much of the momentum, bill. >> yeah, and lyme loi'm lookingd to this next segment. remember the ceo who threatened to lay off workers if president obama was re-elected? let's remember. >> we can't stand another four years like the last four. what we're going to do is we'll probably discontinue our sales. >> well, turns out he's not firing them after all. he gave them all raises. he'll join us next to explain this about face. stay tuned. i was 21, so i said, "hmm, i want to retire at 55." and before you know it, i'm 58 years old. time went by very fast. it goes by too, too fast. ♪ but i would do it again in a heartbeat. [ laughs ] ♪ ♪

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welcome back. david siegel, the ceo of westgate resorts sent an e-mail to employees saying if the president wins re-election, they could all lose their jobs. this was obviously before the election. the e-mail said this. if any new taxes are levied on me or my company as our current president plans, i will have no choice but to reduce the size of this company. >> however, now that the president has been re-elected, mr. siegel hasn't handed out any pink slips. in fact, he handed out raises to all the employees. so why the switch? he joins us now along with with cnbc wealth editor robert frank, who first broke this story. mr. siegel, welcome back. so was that just a political

ploy before the election, or did something change? what happened? >> it was not a political ploy. i never said i was going to fire anyone if president obama got re-elected. what i said is if his policies caused the company to cease making money, to cease expanding, i'll most likely have to lay off people down the road. time will tell. in the meantime, we are the most profitable we've been in our 32-year history. i've got the greatest employees in the world. they've been with me through thick and thin, and i felt they deserved the reward. i wanted to share some of our profits with them. so to help them offset the coming problems they're going to have with obamacare and higher taxes and less take home pay.

>> david, you said -- >> well, what is the pressure, then? when you say obamacare and taxes, how significant are those pressures on your business? i mean, characterize it for us. what are we talking about? >> obamacare, we figure, is going to cost us over $10 million a year coming up. we figured out that's about 250 jobs we won't be hiring. as far as the taxes, you take money out of the pockets of business people, they're going to expand less, hire less, and take less risk. >> robert? >> yeah, david, you know, one of the things you mentioned in your e-mail was that, you know, if obama's re-elected, you may hang up the towel, throw in the towel, go to the beach, close down the company. yet, you mentioned before you're more profitable than ever. you're doing better today financially than you were four years ago. what policies are you really

worried about, and aren't you better off and your company better off than you were during that credit crunch four years ago? >> well, four years ago we were what i called fat, dumb, and happy. we were doing $1 billion a year in sales. we were very profitable. we were expanding 20% a year. we were building. we had $2 billion worth of construction going on. the sky was the limit. after the financial crisis i saw the handwriting on the wall. i got lean and mean, which we are today. we cut our sales in half. we're doing less than $500 million a year in sales, but by getting lean and mean, which meant laying off 7,000 people, we are still very profitable. we're paying down debt very rapidly. but we're not expanding. we're not growing.

we're not looking for new opportunities. we're basically taking care of what we have and doing it very profitably, but we're not paying more taxes to the communities, et cetera, et cetera. >> as it stands right now, we've got a million miles to go before they figure out this fiscal cliff, but what we know today is the president said he would veto any legislation that extended the tax cuts to those americans making more than $250,000 a year, presumably you're included in that. how would that affect your company? >> well, as i said, take money out of my pocket. i'm not going to be able to expand. i'm not going to be able to build more buildings or grow the company. it's just a matter of, you know, economics. i never said i would fire anybody if president obama got re-elected. what i did say, that if it gets to the point where doing business is so hard on me, i

will seriously think of retirement, and of course that would cause the company to further decrease its sales and opportunities. the company will always be there. we have 10,000 villas at 27 resorts in 11 states. they'll always be serviced. there will always be people to check people in, maintain the units. it's just that our sales will cease to continue. >> by the way, would everybody have gotten a raise if romney were elected this week? >> everyone would have gotten a raise regardless of who was elected. two weeks ago i called my entire staff together. i said, i want to double sales this coming year, figure out how we can do it. i still plan to have that same target of doubling sales. however, i am not going to take

the risk that is necessary to do it, but i'm going to keep our goals -- i'm going to try to turn lemons into lemonade. hopefully i'll be successful in doing it. >> all right. good luck with the lemonade. >> great to have you. thanks so much, david. >> thank you, robert, as well. >> see you soon. we just got about ten minutes before the closing bell sounds for the day. we have a market fractionally higher, well off the highs. nasdaq doing well, up about 14 points. >> what to do with this market? should you sit on the sidelines until the fiscal cliff is fixed or are there real bargains to be had right now? sill vir lakes managing partner is next, and he does see some opportunities. >> we'll talk with him. later, how will wall street react if senator elect elizabeth warren gets assigned to the senate banking committee? we'll talk about it. jpmorgan chase chairman and ceo jamie dimon will weigh in exclusively coming up on the "closing bell." we believe the more you know, the better you trade.

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technology stocks are part of the changes today, after getting slammed the two sessions post-election. it's been a struggle for the tech sector overall, which tumbled more than 40% since it peaked in march of 2000. >> so the question is, does this create a buying opportunity for investors, or should investors hold off until the fiscal cliff gets resolved? what does the selloff tell us about what's ahead? i guess, you know, you've got so many successes. you were the architect behind silver lakes skype deal. microsoft scoops it up. congratulations on that. >> thank you. >> that was a huge one.

and you've got other investments. give me the thread. what is it that's driving your investments today. where is the growth in technology. >> so we think this is an incredibly exciting period of time to be investing and looking at opportunities in the technology industry. you have an environment where technology is trading at a discount to market multiples. i think we could all agree that technology is growing at an incredibly rapid rate on a relative basis and growing at an absolute rate. in a world where we are fiscal policy creating asset price volatility, so we all show up to work every day and look at asset prices. in a lot of cases, they're getting whipped around by what government politicians are saying. it feels like an environment where you want to pursue a growth strategy. tech earnings are up over the last five years, but you've seen an incredible multiple compression such that you have

an opportunity or you're effectively being bribed to buy that growth at a discount. >> what i'm asking you though is where is the growth? technology is a wide swath of things. >> the way we think about it is you have a bunch of disruptive themes. social, big cloud, data, et cetera, colliding with mobility. in that, it's creating winners and losers at an accelerating rate, such that you've got a dynamic where you've got companies emerging, and they're killing companies quickly. if you're just trying to identify a segment where there's real opportunity, one theme we're particularly focused on are big tech companies with strong management teams, great brands, customer bases, and a historical track record of success for innovating for multiple product cycles such that they're not going to get disrupted away into the ether. yet, today they're trading at huge discounts on a relative

basis to what we think their long-term growth profiles are. >> bill? >> let me ask you, you mentioned the fiscal policy in washington and its impact on the economy. we're all very tired and weary of talking about the fiscal cliff right now. but it is upon us now. it's time to rise above and fix this whole thing. what impact could it have on innovation and silicon valley in particular depending on the kind of tax policy that emerges from washington. >> i think the way we coach our companies, and we are one of the world's largest technology companies in working with our portfoli portfolios, is to take the long view around this. you have to believe that the government, both here and globally, will continue to invest heavily in job creation, which they all seem to be sayinsay i ing. as part of that, technology is a

core component of each of the fiscal policymakers' sort of ethos or themes. >> how much of an opportunity is health care? i think that's where you're really seeing some transformation. >> yeah, the way we think about it is take each of the subsectors or industries that exist at large. you have health care. you have media. you have energy. retail. they're all being transformed by technology or being tech enabled. we've made investment in a health care company, but the way to think about it is anything that creates efficiency and accuracy with high return on investment for the health care companies by just providing better information and better analytics to help provide health care will take significant cost out of the health care system.

once again, you're sitting in the sweet spot of where fiscal policymakers are trying to move towards. >> look, even i know that the cloud and mobility are good gret opportunities right now, but presumably, you guys are 100 miles down the road ahead of us. what are we going to be talking about in five years or ten years in technology growth? >> i think -- one of the big opportunities that we're focused right now on is the disruption of these other industries. having technology and seeing technology sort of transform them. think about, you know, what will financial services look like five years from now? how will we be consuming media five years from now? that is really a big opportunity as we move forward. >> here's a question. you say you want good management. you want companies that are not easily going to be disrupted. you want cheap.

you want good valuations. is apple cheap? it's down huge since hitting, what, the highs earlier this year. >> if you look at apple on a relative basis, just free cash flow growth, its market position, and its proven history of sort of creating product through multiple innovation cycle and dislocation, on a relative basis, it is cheap, you know, relative to its growth. it's trading nine to ten times free cash flow to earnings. it's growing earnings well in excess of 20% depending on what you believe. there's obviously huge dividend potential related to the cash balance. >> all right. great to talk with you. thank you so much. >> thank you. >> got the closing countdown next. >> that's right. with this market sharply unchanged right now. >> all right. after the bell, it's an interview you can't afford to miss. we'll talk with jpmorgan chairman and ceo jamie dimon on all sorts of topics. stay with us. back in a moment. you take a clo.

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he loves risk. but whether he's climbing everest, scuba diving the great barrier reef with sharks, or jumping into the market, he goes with people he trusts, which is why he trades with a company that doesn't nickel and dime him with hidden fees. so he can worry about other things, like what the market is doing and being ready, no matter what happens, which isn't rocket science. it's just common sense, from td ameritrade. heading toward the close. it's all about the election this week.

this was the dow rallying into the election. the selloff afterwards. for the week, down 2.25%. the best and worst performers, all about the election as well. boeing announcing on wednesday it's going to restructure its defense division anticipating cuts in defense. united health going low we are obamacare about to become the law of the land. could have an impact on their ability to make a buck. and ben willis, you're watching europe this weekend. that could have an impact. >> absolutely. i think talking about obama and having an eskffect is like sayi the donut i had this morning made me fat. it had an impact, but it's not the whole story. that being said, keep an eye on spain. keep an eye on the ratings. >> it's not just about the fiscal cliff after all. thanks, ben. heading toward the close. we are sharply unchanged as we